Cindy
Sheehan, the grieving mother whose courageous battle to meet with George
Bush at his Crawford Texas ranch this August has reinvigorated the
anti-war movement, delivered a letter on October 12 to Governor Arnold
Schwarzenegger’s office at the State Capitol in Sacramento pleading with
him to pull California National Guard troops out of Iraq.

Sheehan’s sister,
Dede Miller, and members of Veterans for Peace, Gold Star Families for
Peace, Military Families Speak Out and CODEPINK Women for Peace
accompanied Sheehan as she walked from the Capitol’s West Steps, through
the Capitol, to the front of the governor’s office. The California Highway
Patrol stopped the group from going into the governor’s office, but
Sheehan was able to meet briefly with a Governor's aide while her
supporters and the media waited.

“California is suffering each day as its law enforcement, corrections,
firefighters are called to a war in Iraq which does not protect the people
of California, leaving the state in a weakened position,” Sheehan wrote.
“California tax dollars are also disproportionately spent on this war.
California men and women are killed and maimed in this war, and their
families are left in ruins, as I too well know”.

She also requested the Governor to ask President Bush three questions he
refuses to answer:

* “What is that "noble cause” that brave Americans like my son Casey and
60 Californians have died for?

* How many more lives are we as a country, and as the State of California
willing to sacrifice in Iraq?

* What are you doing to bring our sons and daughters home from this
needless war?”

Sheehan’s son Casey was killed in Sadr City, Iraq on April 4, 2004 while
serving in the Army. Sheehan delivered a similar letter 10 days before to
Governor Napolitano asking that the Arizona National Guard be recalled.

Republican Governor Schwarzenegger, just like G.W. Bush, has to date
refused to meet with Sheehan. Michael R. Laidwin of the Governor's staff
met with Sheehan for 5 minutes in Schwarzenegger's absence.

“He listened to what I said, said he will pass it on to the governor and
said he would try to arrange a meeting with Schwarzenegger,” Sheehan
explained.

National Guard soldiers from every state in the nation are now stationed
in Iraq. Nearly 6,000 of the California Guard’s troops are stationed
outside the state, the majority of those in Iraq, according to an
article by Will Carless, September 20, 2005. This is more than 25
percent of the guard's total force of 20,000 personnel. This leaves the
state in peril if a disaster like Katrina was to hit Sacramento or other
California cities.

The trip is part of a nationwide campaign by Sheehan and
MeetWithTheMothers.org to get the Governors and legislatures to pull
State National Guard troops out of Iraq.

“What G.W. has done by invading Iraq has made our country so vulnerable,”
Sheehan said. “Katrina was a natural disaster, but it was also a Bush-made
disaster because of the deployment of the National Guard to Iraq.
According to Sheila Jackson Lee, 80 percent of the Guard from the three
Gulf states hit by Hurricane Katrina were deployed in Iraq at the time of
the hurricane.”

After delivering the letter to Schwarzenegger’s office, Sheehan plans to
go next to New York to ask the Governor to pull the state’s Guard members
out of Iraq. “The Guard members signed up to guard their communities, but
were instead sent by George Bush to fight in an illegal war in Iraq,”
Sheehan told me.

Karen Bernal of Sacramento for Democracy, who coordinated volunteers for
the Crawford Peace House for several weeks during Sheehan's vigil at Camp
Casey, pointed out how the deployment of the California National Guard in
Iraq puts Californians at severe risk.

“In the event of any type of disaster in California -- like an earthquake,
flood or catastrophic fire -- the Guard is indispensable and necessary,”
Bernal said. “I hate to think about the large scale loss of lives and
property that would result because the Guard members are fighting in a
foreign war based on a lie.”

Pat Driscoll, founder of the Sacramento Chapter of Veterans for Peace, who
served in the U.S. Navy during the Vietnam War, drew comparisons between
Vietnam and the war in Iraq. “We’re now seeing the same lies, corruption
and attempt to impose ‘democracy by military force that we saw in
Vietnam,” said Driscoll.

However, Driscoll is optimistic that the efforts of Sheehan and other
activists will be able to end the Iraq occupation more quickly than it
took for the U.S. to withdrew from Vietnam because of the rapid manner in
which peace and social justice groups can now organize though global
communications, especially the Internet.

As of this week, 208 troops from California have been killed in Iraq,
including members of the California National Guard, according to Cres
Velucci of Veterans for Peace. On September 2, Assemblymember Loni Hancock
of the introduced a resolution, AJR 36, that would have limited federal
control of the California National Guard to cases where there is an
insurrection or a declaration of war under the United States Constitution.

There is great support throughout California and the country for ending
the Iraq occupation; the most recent Gallup poll found 66 percent of
respondents nationally favor the immediate withdrawal of some or all of
the U.S. troops in Iraq.

In conjunction with Cindy Sheehan’s visit to the Governor’s office, Laurie
and Russell Loving announced the formation of a New Military Families
Speak Out (MFSO) Capital Region Chapter. Their son was deployed to Iraq
this August to do “search and destroy” missions. In his first week there,
13 members of his battalion were severely wounded. The Lovings were
accompanied by another member, Jeanette Maddison, whose son is also
currently deployed
to Iraq.

“I cannot wait in silence as the dead bodies of our family members and the
Iraqi people pile up in a war started by lies and continued for oil
rights,” said Laurie. “Military Families message is three-old: support the
troops, bring them home now, and take care of them when they get here.”

“Anyone who says MFSO members are unpatriotic and don’t support the troops
is flat-out wrong,” added Russell, a Vietnam era veteran. “The troops are
our family members.”

Dan
Bacher is
an outdoor writer, alternative journalist and satirical song writer from
Sacramento, California. He is editor of the Central America Connection and
contributes to numerous publications and websites, including Dissident
Voice, CounterPunch, Because People Matter and the
Sacramento News & Review. Email:
danielbacher@hotmail.com.